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Weaponizing Absurdity

January 24, 2018 - 11:37pm  grant

Raunchy Russian Cadets Set Off Wave of Political Solidarity

by:

John Grant

For me, an absurd state of mind hovered in the air this past weekend in Philadelphia. Saturday, over 50,000 people showed up for the Women's March lobbying for sane government on Benjamin Franklin Boulevard between City Hall and the “Rocky steps” of the Art Museum. Watching the local Action News later that Saturday, the first half of the show was devoted entirely to the football playoffs -- scheduled for the next day! Action News did do a brief piece on the march; it felt like an obligatory afterthought. On Sunday, the Philadelphia Eagles brutalized the Minnesota Vikings 38 to 7. Afterwards, some 6,000 joyous and drunken fans took over Broad Street. As Philadelphia fans are notorious for, fans jeered and threw beer cans at the Vikings players as their bus passed by to their hotel. NFL games start with sexy flyovers by the Air Force Blue Angels and too often end with a drunken mob that has all the magnanimity and grace of National Guard members tuning up captured Iraqis at Abu Ghraib. It's Trump America in miniature -- the NFL as a classic fascist pincer: beer-guzzling mob thuggery at the fan level and plutocratic greed at the owner level. This is where NFL football loses me. As in the real militarism game, the word is Minnesota fans will be looking for revenge when Philadelphia fans get to the Super Bowl in Minneapolis. As for the post-game hooligans on Broad Street, the Philadelphia police did a fine job controlling the mayhem. One man was arrested for punching a police horse in the mouth.

Two big Philly crowds. Which one got the attention? No wonder America has its head up its ass.

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